Money. But you're missing the point - int he period I'm discussing, Vitali fought Adamek and Wlad fought Haye. Nobody else was ruled out in the method you are describing. It just didn't happen.
Judging by Haye’s heavyweight resume, I’m not convinced he wanted to fight Vitali. Adamek could easily claim to have accomplished equal or more than Haye at heavy.
In fairness to Vitali- he wanted the unification fight with Valuev and IMO he would have dominated the 7 footer and possibly got the stop by the 10th rd. The WBC did the same thing with Larry Holmes who fought fighters with 10-12-13-14-15-16 fights - It was frustrating at the time as a fan. Kirk Johnson had KO'd Oleg Maskaev and was a solid impressive win for Vitali but the organizations always hurt boxing with split titles-paid for rankings and unqualified challengers. How about starting a ESB sanctioning body? Why Not- Fairness -unification and 1 Champion in each division- Need someone young with vast boxing knowledge - there are many on here with knowledge to start an ESB board
Interesting post .. I guess we need to keep in mind the way he came back out of nowhere from bad injuries to beat the prime Peters with no tune up too .. I'm a believe that he was never the same fighter that fought Lewis and crushed Johnson and that he learned to fight with the limitations of his injuries .. That said for that window of time I don't see anyone who would have beaten him including his brother but neither beats a prime Lewis
Just looking at the alternative opponents that you have suggested, none of them look very realistic. For example would Haye, Chagaev or Valuev have agreed to a fight, if Vitally had picked up the phone to them? My guess is that they would either have gone for something safer, or said "go big or go home, I want Wald!"
Yeah, it's possible that he just couldn't make a fight with anyone good on those occasions and was forced to take on no-hopers, and that Chagaev, Haye, Valuev, Povetkin, Pulev, Chambers, Dimitrenko, Helenius, Boystov and anyone else I mentioned would have hung up on Vitali rather than fight him for his belt and the second biggest purse available in the division; while Maskaev, Adamek, Gomez, Peter and Arreola felt some other way, not so cowardly or greedy or whatever it was. I'll make two observations. First, you are showing an astonishing level of generosity to this fighter, completely devoid of any supporting evidence, in assuming so (For some reason). Second, if it were true, it would make no difference to Vitali's ring legacy. For the avoidance of doubt, I think it's a large and rather inexplicable reach, but concede it is not absolutely impossible.
Briggs agreed to fight him for 750k, from memory. But $1M dollars is low enough to be weird, if true, despite that. Adamek got 30%, I believe. I agree that wouldn't be an acceptable offer if it were made.
The operative term is "second biggest purse!" Wait until he is matched against an ATG, in a fantasy fight, and then I will show you a lack of generosity! My take is that he got injured at the worst possible time, and that he basically missed the boat! After that he ended up picking up the scraps from Wlad's table. More bad luck, than bad decisions, after he got injured!
This. Back and knee surgeries had severely limited his dynamism and made him ever more of an arm puncher. Still.he came back after a very long layoff and beat a guy everyone considered the most dangerous heavy out there.
Yes, a colossal motivator for any fighter by my eyes: the second biggest purse available to a fighter in his entire life. Reportage of Wilder being unable to get fights because of Anthony Joshua/Ruiz's having more belts: absolute zero. I understand we see things very differently and we can leave it there. Maybe. I personally believe that alpha millionaire sportsmen have much more autonomy than you do.
Just a few notes and corrections 1 ) Its not Vitali's fault Haye backed out of a chance to meet him and Valuev said no thanks as well. Keep in mind Vitali was in his late 30's to 40's for these fights. What Champion faced more ranked contenders and beat them at this age? You tell me McGrain. He was an active older champion. 2 ) Vitali was supposed to fight Tyson as you mentioned. When Williams upset Tyson, he was the man in. Vitali showed nice skills here, even impressing one Roy Jones with the KO. He was eying politics at this point in time. 3 ) Correction for you. >>> Kevin Johnson was undefeated and ranked #10 by ring magazine. Older champions seldom fight younger / faster / defensive guys. Vitali won every round. This was a fine match up on paper. 4 ) Briggs was a puncher and former lineal champion. Vitali gave him a beating in a fight that should have been stopped. Briggs was also the younger man in this fight. 5 ) Adamek was ranked #3 by Ring magazine. A fine choice of an opponent. 5 ) You missed Sam Peter, who then was a feared man. Or are you only counting title defenses? " Good fight? " When one person is all world, even ranked contenders don't put up good fights. Did Mayweather have good fights? How about Roy Jones ( When he won ). This is irrelevant. I guess to qualify as a " good fight " , Vitali would be to be stunned, rocked or floored like Joe Louis was vs the bum of the months types, or out boxed like Ali was vs Jimmy Young , Lyle and Leon Spinks. Vitlai was too good of a boxer mover to lose rounds, and was too durable to be hurt by that puncher's chance moment. I would have liked to see Haye and Valuev not he resume and of course the rematch by Lewis, but these men just did not want this fights. It is what it is. I don't think Wilder has beaten anyone as good as the Arreola or or Gomez that Vitali fought. Add Sanders to that list as well. And Peter. The day Wilder gives a puncher a chance like Briggs, ping me. And well see how good Wilder looks at age 37-41. Only Joshua today is proven vs top ten competition in their prime.